Everyone knows about the Nobel Prize. This isn't that. Not really. The Ig Nobel Prizes are for people whose science makes people laugh, then think. These prizes go to those find unusual and imaginative things. They're fun.
The 34th Ig Nobel Prize ceremony happened about two months ago, so it's not nearly as old as Nobel prizes, and it happened at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) instead of Harvard, where it had been previous years. 10 Ig Nobel Prizes are awarded every year, from the research gathered by the Annals of Improbable Research.
Among winners have been a chemistry/geology win that answered the question of why geologists and paleontologists lick rocks--it makes them easier to study!--a medical win of someone who did a study of the number of hairs in people's left nostril versus their right, in nutrition, there was a study of if adding an electric current to your tongue alters the taste of food, and so on.
One that stuck with me from when I first learned about this, was a woman who found a way to turn a bra into a pair of gas masks. While that sounds ridiculous, and no one argues that, she actually had a good reason for trying that because she born in Ukraine and was there for Chernobyl, and she noticed that a lot of the damage came from breathing stuff in, so she wanted something that would be everywhere that she could turn into a gas mask for everyone to use as gas masks.
Another thing that stuck with me about this award is that, at the ceremony, after about a minute, a robot of a little girl called Miss. Sweetie-Poo, or an appropriate actual little girl, comes up to the podium and says 'Please Stop, I'm Bored', until everyone clears the stage. So, no long speeches, no boredom, and lots of laughter.
For more information about the prize, the winners, and a few other things, please check the sources below.
Sources:
BioTech--Some of the winners of the Ig Nobel Prize
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